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Topic: The Hope Experiments (Read 173 times)

In the 1950s, Curt Paul Richter, a Harvard graduate and Johns Hopkins scientist, did a series of experiments that tested how long rats could swim in a high-sided bucket of circulating water before drowning. Dr. Richter found that, under normal conditions, a rat could swim for an average of 15 minutes before giving up and sinking. However, if he rescued the rats just before drowning, dried them off and let them rest briefly, and then put them back into the same buckets of circulating water, the rats could swim an average of 60 hours before drowning. Yes, 60 hours. If a rat was temporarily saved, it would survive 240 times longer than if it was not temporarily saved. This makes no sense. How could these rats swim so much longer the second time, especially just after swimming as long as possible to stay alive? Dr. Richter concluded that the rats were able to swim longer because they were given hope. A better conclusion is that the rats were able to swim longer because they were given energy through hope. The rats had a clear picture of what being saved looked like, so they kept swimming for it.

Yes, Cyberia, I certainly understand how cruel and immoral that was. Nevertheless, Dr Richter did the experiment in the 50's and saw these results in this study of psychology. I thought the idea and results were worth posting - if I offended you, I apologize. I should have given a trigger warning. There may be a chance a college professor speaking about this study today could be fired.